Realization
by Pinery
Summary: What if Char found out something was amiss when he met Ella during Sir Peter's wedding? What if Char found out about Ella's curse that very evening? Read to find out. And my dear readers, please read and review. All comments welcomed.
1. Chapter 1

Summary: What if at the castle, Char has detected something amiss when Ella said that sometimes it is better to love if one is forced into wedlock.

Chapter 1

Char's POV

My mind was adrift elsewhere contemplating my love for Ella when she pronounced the words:" Sometimes it is better to love if one's forced into wedlock." My mind instantly snapped back, Ella seemed full of melancholy when she said it,

maybe she is promised to another that she doesn't love. I frantically thought of an explanation for her strange behavior. But then again, she could be thinking of arranged marriage in general instead of herself. The thought comforted me somehow, but I was still full of doubt, full of worry that she might be promised to another.

I tried to compose myself in front of her, we exchanged another few words and then I left to attend to my duties back at the castle.

After finishing my daily duties, I leaned back on my chair and continued thinking about Ella. About her smile, her sparkling eyes, her gracefulness, and her ease with everyone around her. As my valet readied my trunks for the journey to Ayortha tomorrow, I again thought about the strange Ella today, I could tell that something is amiss, but then, Ella was always a bit strange. I smiled at my own joke, and started my train of thoughts on Ella's strangeness. Firstly, she could tame ogres. Secondly, she could charm all the people around her. Thirdly...... My head snapped up from my sudden conclusion: Ella does everything anyone commands her to do! I startled at the conclusion. Could it be....That Ella was cursed!

I jumped up from my chair and ordered my valet to bring my fastest horse to me. I MUST clear that with Ella since I will be going away tomorrow.

As I approached the gate of her manor, I could hear her step sisters shrieking in the most frightening way possible. I frowned at the disasterous sound and grinned when I thought what Ella would do on such an occasion. She would wiggle her fingers at the sound and use her best manner mistress voice to say:" Nowadays young ladies such as these don't care two straws about proper behavior, what would King Jerrold say if he knows of it! They would certainly be evicted from the kingdom!"

The thought of Ella made me smile and gave me the courage to bear the onslaughts of the female dragons in the manor. I kept a tight grin in check and walked into the house, the effusion was just as what I thought, it seems that Hattie's wig has been pulled off by Oliver when she tried to grab 10 KJs from her sister.

It was all I can do to not laugh when Hattie froze mid-step when she saw me stepping into the entrance, her face contorted into a big-rabbit-tooth smile and fawned all over me. Unfortunately for her, I was not in the mood of being fawned by one of my female subjects. I demanded to see Ella, and when Hattie told me that Ella is out, I pushed her aside and walked upstairs to find Ella sitting in her armchair, looking displeased

For one moment I almost thought that she was displeased to see me! But of course, when she looked up from the floor, she was startled at the presence of another person in the room, but then, she gave a most amiable smile and invited me to sit down, she told me that she was displeased at Hattie for lying about her absence. Then she asked me if I came to say farewell to her. I nodded, and hesitantly, I told her there is another that is troubling my mind.

After she knitted her eyebrows together in concentration of thinking what troubled me, I released her from her agony of having no knowledge and told her suspicion. As I finished my tale, Ella's eyes grew larger and larger, until they were wide as the eyes of doe. After telling, I asked her whether it is true. But she shook her head, unable to say a thing, she seemed to struggle to say something. At last, she failed, and used up all her strength and told me in a whisper:" Go ask Mandy about it, she will give you an answer, I'm sorry that I'm unable to tell you the truth." Then without so much as a farewell, she pushed me out rather roughly and looked at me with her tear-stained eyes for one last time and shut her door firmly.


	2. Chapter 2

Author's note

Hi guys I'm back, I'm sorry I didn't update for a lot of time but I was busy with my admission tests and application stuff for US Boarding Highs. Well, my hard work paid off, I'm now officially enrolled by Lawrenceville School in NJ and Milton Academy in MA.

Realization

Chapter II

Ella's POV

It was the best way, I couldn't let Char be ruined because of me. I thought resolutely as I plucked out the last petal out of the rose I now held in hand, tears flowing from my eyes freely and falling on the perfectly clean carpet, ruining it. He'll probably want to have nothing to do with me after his interview with Mandy, as the thought hit me, fresh tears came surging through my already blurred vision. My sorrow was at a point so great that I can endure it no longer. I fell back onto my mattress and let out sobs, shaking my body and my mind and shattering them to pieces, along with my fantasy of being married to Char. He will never want me, he will never want to have a cursed girl as his bride. As I thought, fresh tears started staining my eyes again.

Char's POV

I don't understand why Ella would push me out, if she loves me, she would try to overcome the problem with me together, not evading it. I thought as I went along to Mandy's room. But if, what if, what if Ella doesn't love me at all? What if she just thinks me as a good friend, not someone she could trust so much as to tell her secret? I asked myself. Then, I realized it, I froze mid-step and was suddenly saddened and angered at my own ridiculousness of presuming that Ella loved me. I turned sharply towards the door, pushed the fawning sisters and mother out of my way and jumped onto my horse without so much as a farewell.

Narrator's POV

Char walked out of the house with long, resolute strides. Ella watched him silently at her window, but he never turned back. What she had always feared has happened, and the smallest hope in her heart was dying. She climbed onto her bed, and sobbed into the mattress with a feeling of desperation. She thought herself as the most unfortunate person in the world at that moment. But alas, there was another person who was suffering a bigger agony at the same time. Clever readers, I think without my hint, you can easily figure out that the person was Char. He was even more in love with Ella than Ella with him, he not only lost his hope, but also thought himself as the most presumptuous human being in Kyrria. He rode with a brooding countenance, even his horse sensed it. Unknowingly, the horse led Char to the old castle. The sudden stop startled Char and he jumped back into reality. He was even more surprised when he found out that he was at the old castle, where he first thought to have caught a hint of Ella's love for him, but it turned out to be an illusion, a dream of his that could never come true. He jumped off the horse and strolled around with no purpose.

But when he came into the sight of the candle grove trees, he couldn't repress the urging in his mind to kneel down in front of the tree and make a wish, just as he did when he was a young boy of eleven. He recalled that he used to wish for a real adult horse to ride on his birthday, and next day he got his wish. He smiled in rememberance of the past, and kneeled down. Without thinking, he said," I wish to know if Ella loves me." When he realized what he had said, he regretted it immediately. One can only make three wishes come true in one's lifetime, and he has wasted one wish on such a thing. It seems that the fact Ella doesn't love him is stuck in Char's mind and he couldn't let it go. Just then, surprisingly, the candle grove tree spoke.

( Trees aren't supposed to speak, I know, I just can't resist the temptation of magical trees~ ~~~~Love from Pinery.)


End file.
